A Request To You Tube Content Creators; Short Rant Friday!

Derelict, Bull Island, Virginia (click to enlarge)
Fujifilm X-T2, 50-140mm f/2.8 lens @ 140mm; 1/170th sec. @ f/8; ISO 200

I really enjoy watching You Tube videos.  From photography, to travel, to railroads, to RV life to automobile related videos, I can find just about anything in which I'm interested on You Tube.  Also, I can find a video about anything I want to buy, fix or replace.  To all of the You Tube content creators, I say thank you.  Thank you for your hard work, your creativity, the money you have spent on your equipment and the long hours you spend editing all that video.  I really enjoy the product of your efforts.  You bring value to my life.  But...

I do find one really aggravating aspect with You Tube content creators.  This holds true especially for photography and travel content creators.  I have a request.  Please.  I'm asking nicely.  I've already told you how much I appreciate you.  I don't want to sound mean or ugly when I say this....

When you are out in the environment, in nature, walking along a foot path for a distance, and/or are describing a beautiful landscape, sky, waterfall, woodland, body of water or you are visiting iconic places, now listen to me closely, TAKE THE CAMERA OFF OF YOURSELF AND TURN THE CAMERA ON THE PLACE YOU ARE DESCRIBING!  (I'm not shouting but using caps to emphasize my frustration...)

I don't understand why you almost always keep the camera on yourself for at least 90% of your video and not show us viewers where you are and what you are seeing?  Is it ego? Vanity? Narcissism? Not sufficiently thinking things through or maybe just you just don't understand?  I'd much rather see your surroundings as you describe them or talk rather than look at you and imagine what beautiful landscape you are describing.  Now, don't get me wrong.  Seeing you for the introduction and ending is fine—and periodically at times as well.  I just want to see what you are seeing for the majority of the video instead of you walking along talking and me having to look at you continuously.

WE KNOW WHAT YOU LOOK LIKE.  WE'VE SEEN YOU MANY, MANY TIMES.  WE, YOUR AUDIENCE, WANT TO SEE WHAT YOU ARE SEEING AND DESCRIBING TO US.  WE DON'T NEED TO SEE THAT MUCH OF YOU!  

I'm sure you look really good, but we've seen you in every video and for almost the entire video.  Next time you are at the Grand Canyon, Yosemite, Alaska, the Florida Keys, the Lake District, the Welsh coast, the Peak District, the Scottish Highlands, an enchanted forest, a beautiful lake, or anywhere else, I would really appreciate it if, after a short introduction featuring YOU, you would just turn the camera around and show us where you are and what you are experiencing.  It would be much more meaningful and visually interesting.

Please.  We know what you look.  We like you and appreciate your work or we wouldn't be coming back to look at subsequent videos.  But we want you to just turn the camera toward where you are walking, at what you are seeing or at what you are describing, etc.  That will make for a much more interesting videos instead of keeping the camera on yourself for most all of the time.  My thanks in advance to you.

Rant over.  Sorry about that.

Thank you for your patience.

Join me over at Instagram @dennisamook or my website, www.dennismook.com. 

Thanks for looking. Enjoy! 

Dennis A. Mook 

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